I thought the movie adaptation was fantastic. I love me some hard sci fi once in a while, so I figured I’d eventually read the book. I was gonna look into buying something from the Thrawn trilogy, but The Martian was on sale at iBooks, so I decided to get that first.

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The very thing that gives us humans our advanced cognitive abilities can also be our greatest weakness.

It's a series consists of three trilogies and one tetralogy. I can't remember titles of all the books and to which sub-series they belong so I'll go with numbers. Here's a link to an article at Wikipedia that lists all the books in the series: The Realm of the Elderlings

I enjoyed the 1st trilogy, The Farseer Trilogy, even though the final book in that one was a bit slow and I almost gave up on it.I skipped the 2nd trilogy, The Liveship Traders and went on to read the 3rd one, The Tawnyman Trilogy. I finished it yesterday. I didn't read any other books in this series but I think the next I'll read will be the 2nd trilogy.

The 2 trilogies I read were focused around Fitz. I really liked the character and the world, despite the fact that I didn't like the 3rd book in the original trilogy.I missed the world and the characters and was curious what happened to Fitz after the original trilogy. I'm glad I decided to read the 3rd trilogy, which continues Fitz' story. It was great and I recommend it if you like at least some of the books in the original trilogy.

In other news, The Oathbringer, the 3rd book in Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive series is about to be released

I thought it was extremely slow. The last 10-15 % was great. I just kept waiting for something to happen before that though. 55 hr audiobook. I usually read at least some of the time but I went full audio on this one. Maybe that was part of the issue. I even sped it up by 15% because things were just dragging on and on. For some reason I just feel like he could have written this series in 4 books and he's making it 10 so that it's "epic" fantasy. Not that it's terrible or anything. Just drawn out more than I think it should be. Maybe I'm just suffering fantasy fatigue. I just have a hard time finding much else that is any better.

I enjoyed The Water Knife by Paolo Bacigalupi. I read it to just to take a survey on mturk lol. But it was actually good. I figured I might as well make the money they were offering as I would have read some other book that week anyway. Ended up liking it enough that I'll read more of his books if there are any. Scary glimpse into the future of what we might be facing before too long if we keep building cities that don't have adequate water supplies etc. It centered on a guy who enforces the water rights for one territory. Sort of a hit man/killer etc. and a journalist who writes about the failing cities. They get tied up in trying to figure out what's happened to some long lost water rights someone was playing off two sides that wanted the water. He's chasing the people and she's chasing a story. I was really surprised I liked it.

The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump was eye opening. And scary. Not that it told me anything I didn't either know or suspect. How that man ended up President..... sigh. Anyway if you have about 6-7 hrs you can read it pretty quickly. Cliff notes are: He's mental. And we're fucked. He's quite likely to do anything and everything to avoid anything other than praise for him.

That's the extent of my reading for December. I usually do a bit more but Oathbringer took up all my normal audiobook time and I've taken a break since I finished. Trying to find something to get excited about reading again.

"Every man is a creature of the age in which he lives, and few are able to raise themselves above the ideas of their time." “Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities.” ~~Voltaire

I finished The Long Price quartet yesterday. It's the first thing from Daniel Abraham I read and I really enjoyed it.

It's not your usual medieval Europe based fantasy. There's not much action either. It has far east feel to it. I liked the characters and how they changed from being antagonist in one book to being a protagonist in another. Not sure if protagonist/antagonist is accurate descriptions, though. In most cases you can see and understand their motivation and why they land on the side of the conflict they are on. I should mention that the books stretch some 80 years, so you can see how the world and characters changed throughout the period and how their actions influenced the world.

WarK wrote:I finished The Long Price quartet yesterday. It's the first thing from Daniel Abraham I read and I really enjoyed it.

It's not your usual medieval Europe based fantasy. There's not much action either. It has far east feel to it. I liked the characters and how they changed from being antagonist in one book to being a protagonist in another. Not sure if protagonist/antagonist is accurate descriptions, though. In most cases you can see and understand their motivation and why they land on the side of the conflict they are on. I should mention that the books stretch some 80 years, so you can see how the world and characters changed throughout the period and how their actions influenced the world.

I really like his work. His Dagger and Coin series is very good as well. Similar Far East feel a little more action. He's really become one of my favorite writers just because he doesn't do the same wizard and sword stuff that everyone else does.

I've been reading The Hundred Thousand Kindoms by N.K. Jemisin as well as China Mieville's Bas Lag series. Both are different but also considered "fantasy". If you want more "different' fantasy check those out.

"Every man is a creature of the age in which he lives, and few are able to raise themselves above the ideas of their time." “Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities.” ~~Voltaire

It's been several long years since I last read a fanfic of any sort. Most fanfics are crap, although I'm willing to wager that Sturgeon's Law applies to regular published literature as well, though I'll grant there's likely marginally better quality control. Anyway, since I've been getting back into the habit of reading, I figured I'd download some particularly notable fanfics from fandoms I am involved in. Being the sucker for crossovers that I am, I've chosen the cult classic Fallout: Equestria, and boy, is it a big one.

It's holding my attention quite nicely. I love the dark atmosphere it has, and while I've never actually played a Fallout game in my life, its post-apocalypse setting has attracted my attention multiple times, to the point where I've come very close to actually trying Fallout 3, which I have on my Xbox. I have the original Fallout on Steam, but unfortunately it doesn't run on Mac, so I can't play it until I get a Windows PC. Alternatively, I could use Wine, but I'm too lazy to try that; most of my other daily activities tend to take priority.

Anyway, I find this fic enjoyable so far. Though I'm noticing our protagonist has... issues. I definitely wouldn't call her a "hero"; at the point I'm at, she's starting to enjoy leaving trails of bodies a little too much. Sure, they're bodies of horrible sons of bitches in a wasteland where an entire civilization was annihilated by the setting's analogue for nuclear weapons, but still, something's rubbing me the wrong way about that. At least this character is making friends, so they should be able to keep her from becoming too kill-happy.

The very thing that gives us humans our advanced cognitive abilities can also be our greatest weakness.

Just finished Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. It documents his psychological experiences in Auchwitz and other concentration camps. There's a great quote that goes like this:

"We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms---to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way."

It has really given me some perspective on a lot of things. Part of the book talks about his approach to psychology in which he offers the sage advice to live your life as though you're on your second play through and you did everything wrong the first time. I can see myself returning to it in future. It's a great, distressing, yet uplifting book.

No joke, it’s probably my favorite piece of fan work since Red VS Blue or even the My Little Pony/Ace Attorney crossover on YouTube, Turnabout Storm. I see now why people like it so much that it spawned a fandom of its own.

If anyone’s interested, I may even write up a review here.

I’m not hopping off this fanfic train yet, though. Next up on my reading list is Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality. I don’t even like Harry Potter, but apparently this book, a so-called “rational fic”, has quite a following of its own, and I’ve had it recommended to me a good handful of times. It seems particularly popular among transhumanists; in fact, it was a transhumanist who wrote it.

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The very thing that gives us humans our advanced cognitive abilities can also be our greatest weakness.